Transcript Presentation - Science for Energy Scenarios

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Summing it up:
A couple of implications for
collective decision
Les Houches
11 March 2016
Jean-Marc Jancovici
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
My first major conclusion
Use big fonts for legends!
In the room you have ordinary people, not eagles
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Some more minor ones
In real life, we never choose between paradise
and hell. We make trade offs.
The “fossil predicament” is choosing between a
short and exciting fireworks, and a longer and
more austere lifestyle.
Can the small community that gathered in Les
Houches for 5 days can help to make better trade
offs?
“better” refers to a moral judgment, so it does not
belong to science. But “better informed
decisions”, that we can definitely try to achieve.
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New world, new science
How do we invest to mitigate climate change or adapt in a
recessive world?
How do we invest with zero interest rates?
How do we create “clients”, e. g. people that have an interest in
understanding what we do?
Given the major role of energy supply in modern societies, that
is on parity with the major role of a stable environment, we
must build the “energy IPCC”, that provides the scientific basis
for energy planning (which drives the “wealth of nations” and
the sustainability):
Explicit and normative definitions whenever possible
Ways to sort between what is physically possible and what is not
Methods to explicit counterparts that are not present in scenarios
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The laws of physics will always
remain stronger than our desires
The law of conservation imposes that men can only
extract from the environment some energy that already
exists there (primary energy)
All primary energies are free: no one ever paid a single
cent for the formation of oil, gas, waterfalls or coal. Fossil
fuels are as free as renewables.
The “cost of energy” represents only salaries and rents
that had to be paid to other humans in the course of
extracting energy from the environment. Nature never gets
paid.
The more an energy source is diffuse and non
manageable, the more difficult it is to extract it from the
environment in the form of high power, and the more
expensive/capital intensive it will be. It’s just physics.
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Using oil is probably slightly easier
than using wind
10 m
Renewables -> fossil : price / 50-100
=
80 km/h
3 millilitres !
0,3 cents per kWh (manageable)
10 m
8 cents per kWh (without buffering), 25-50 (with buffering)
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Once we were renewable and
sustainable…
World energy 1860-2014. Jancovici, on Shilling et al before 1965, BP after, misc.
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Once we were renewable and
sustainable…
World energy 1860-2014. Jancovici, on Shilling et al before 1965, BP after, misc.
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Once we were renewable and
sustainable…
World energy 1860-2014. Jancovici, on Shilling et al before 1965, BP after, misc.
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Once we were renewable and
sustainable…
World energy 1860-2014. Jancovici, on Shilling et al before 1965, BP after, misc.
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Once we were renewable and
sustainable…
World energy 1860-2014. Jancovici, on Shilling et al before 1965, BP after, misc.
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Once we were renewable and
sustainable…
World energy 1860-2014. Jancovici, on Shilling et al before 1965, BP after, misc.
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Once we were renewable and
sustainable…
What gets journalists excited
Look at transparent and
comprehensive calculations,
published in technical and scientific
papers, and forget the newspaper
World energy 1860-2014. Jancovici, on Shilling et al before 1965, BP after, misc.
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All energies are equal, but some are
more equal than others
Specific energies allow for specific transformations and
thus specific activities
When going from an energy to another for the same use,
there are transition costs, even among fossil fuels ->
never discard them
For example, the capex for conventional oil in the Middle
East is circa 20 k$/barrel.day; the capex for tar sands is
circa 150 k$/barrel.day
With the same money, you will get 5 times less annual
production in tar sands than in conventional oil… as long
as there is some
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Nietzsche wanted supermen, oil did
the job
80 kg + 10 kg
up 2000 m
≈ 0,5 kWh
1 day out of 2: 100 kWh/year
@ 1000 €/month: 200 €/kWh
Even a slave: 4-40 €/kWh
6
m3
earth lifted
up 1 m
0,05 kWh per day
(10 kWh/year)
2000 €/kWh
x 10
1,5 €/L :
0,4 €/kWh
÷ 500
10 kWh
÷ 10100
x 100
÷
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5000
2-4 kWh
mechanical
output
1L
Yummy kWh, or plenty of (fossil)
food for plenty of machines…
+0,4% / year
20.000 kWh per person and
per year ≈ 200 energy slaves
per capita
+2,5% / year
Energy consumption per capita, 1880 to 2013. Source: Jancovici, 2014, on primary data
coming from Schilling et al., 1977, BP Statistical Review, 2014, UN & World Bank 2014
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Our economy seen by (super)
Mario
Capital
Productive system
Work
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Production
Actually, you'd better have some
resource!
Resources
Capital
Productive system
Work (transformation)
Muscles = 1
Machines + Energy = 200 !
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Production
The best macroeconomic model in
the world: a straight line
2014
1965
Energy consumption vs. GDP in constant $ for the world, 1965 to 2014. Source
World Bank 2014 for the GDP, BP Statistical Review 2014 for energy
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And when availability is an issue,
electoral promises have a hard time
2014
1965
Energy consumption vs. GDP in constant $ for Spain, 1965 to 2014. Source World
Bank 2014 for the GDP, BP Statistical Review 2014 for energy
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Think with the correct causal link!
It’s because we have energy that we have transformation and
therefore GDP. It is not because we have transformation (GDP)
that we have energy!
Never think “energy demand”. Think “energy availability”
instead.
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Assessing GDP? Forget the price!
2014
1960
Oil price in constant $ per barrel (horizontal axis) vs GDP in constant $ (vertical
axis) for the world, 1965 to 2013. Jancovici, on World Bank & BP Statistical Review
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Is the price of oil elastic?
2014
1921
1986
2001
1973
Oil consumption in the world (horizontal exis) vs. price per barrel in constant
dollars (vertical axis). Jancovici, 2014, on various data (oil prices from BP Stat).
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Fancy calculating a “real” price ?
X 15 !
1860 1880
1973
2014
Constant $ per barrel. Source BP Statistical
Review, 2015
1860
1900
1950
2000
Reconstruction of the GDP per capita in
the US
Source : Historical Statistics for the World
Economy, Angus Maddison, 2007
In a century, the real price of a mechanical kWh has been divided by 30 to 50 in
Western Countries -> any transformation of natural resources has seen its real
cost divided by the same number -> most real prices have evolved the same
way
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The party was more and more
funny… then hangovers began
Change of the primary energy supply in OECD countries since 1965. Jancovici, on data from
BP Statistical Review 2015 & World Bank.
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What is the appropriate way to
analyze past data?
Annual change of the primary energy supply in OECD since 1965. Jancovici, on data from
BP Statistical Review 2015.
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But the causal link is alive and well
Annual change of the OECD growth rate since 1960, and prolongation of trend. Jancovici, on
data from World Bank 2015.
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What future?
Past energy consumption in the OECD region and three ways to extrapolate. Jancovici, on
data from BP Statistical Review 2015.
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Do we have energy or energy?
Raw coal
Crude
oil
Crude
gas
Engineers
+ losses
Steal coal,
coke…
Motion
Refined
fuels
Heat
Purified
gas
+ losses
Transformation
Fissile
nucleus
Electricity
Wood, wind,
waterfalls,
sun…
Steam, hot
water… and
maybe H2
Primary
Unclear
Final
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Work!
Useful
Savings? What savings?
I get the same services with less energy –> Efficiency
I drive the same mileage, in a car of the same weight and engine power, but
technical
leads tospace,
less consumption
per car
I live in improvement
the same housing
but insulation
leads to less energy
consumption
I buy the same quantity of shirts and beauty cream, but they have been
manufactured with less energy
I deliberately decrease my consumption of goods and
services,
and
hence
usecarless
Sobriety
I drive less,
or in
a smaller
that energy
uses less–>
gasoline,
and I do it from my
own will
II decrease
my housing
spacecream,
(smaller
flat,
co-rent)
buy less shirts
and beauty
and
door
not
buy more of something else to
compensate
I decrease my consumption – and thus use less energy but I never asked for it –> Poverty
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If we want to be heard, we have to be
precise
EROI is a good proxy for availability, capital costs, final price to
end consumer, and in the end industrial production per capita.
As a potent indicator to “be honest”, it has to be precisely
defined.
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EROI philosophy -> what energy input
does the energy output relies on?
Primary
energy
Other
Resources
Losses
Final
energy
All free, took 14
billion years
since the Big
Bang
Services
Losses
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Terms of reference #1: climate
2015
Cumulated CO2 emissions
since 1870 in billion tonnes
Average temperature increase 1850-2100 depending on cumulated emissions. IPCC, 2015
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No more than 700-1000 Gt CO2, who
does without?
Potential emissions associated to burning all proven reserves, in billion metric tons of CO2.
Jancovici, on data from BP Stat 2015.
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Dividing emissions by 3, where do we
start?
Other
Deforestation
Coal power plants
Oil & gas
power
plants
Cement
Agriculture
≈ 6%
≈ 4%
≈ 2%
Transportation
≈ 2%
Boilers in
buildings
Other industry
Breakdown of world emissions in 2014. Jancovici, on various data.
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Is Kyoto of any use?
Divided by 3
I ratify
Divided by 3…
I do not ratify
Energy efficiency of the US and European economies, in grams of CO2 per
constant $ of GDP. Primary data from BP Statistical Review (energy) and World
Bank (GDP), calculations by the author.
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Some very simple conclusions…
extremely hard to accept
After two centuries of growth, we have lost our habits of ruling
a constrained world. The good question is not how we avoid
“degrowth”, but how we manage it at best. EROI can help in
that respect.
As less energy = less GDP, going low carbon is equivalent to
triggering a recession. In a democracy, we must think of the
counterpart that makes it desirable/manageable for a majority.
Engineers can help explicit “physical” counterparts (e. g. you
cannot extract oil and still have the same amount in the
ground), sort between what is possible and what is not, but in
the end the society decides (even imperfectly) for itself.
Less energy = less GDP. Going to zero carbon in 65 years is
equivalent to following a recessive path, that we accept
because it allows our species to (sur)vive longer.
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